David Kaiser is Germeshausen Professor of the History of Science in MIT's Program in Science, Technology, and Society, and also Professor of Physics in MIT's Department of Physics. He completed an A.B. in physics at Dartmouth College and Ph.D.s in physics and the history of science at Harvard University. Kaiser's historical research focuses on the development of physics in the United States during the Cold War, looking at how the discipline has evolved at the intersection of politics, culture, and the changing shape of higher education. His physics research focuses on early-universe cosmology, working at the interface of particle physics and gravitation. He has also helped to design novel experiments to test the foundations of quantum theory.

I have long been fascinated by the interplay between ideas and institutions. Becoming a physicist in 1860s Britain or 1910s Germany was not the same as in 1950s America. What effects did those differences in training regimes and research institutions have on the knowledge that was produced? More broadly, how does scientific knowledge -- that paragon of objectivity, seemingly impervious to political exigencies or cultural cues -- bear the marks of time and place?

Drawing Theories Apart: The Dispersion of Feynman Diagrams in Postwar Physics(University of Chicago Press, 2005) traces how the American physicist Richard Feynman's idiosyncratic approach to quantum physics entered the mainstream. Ubiquitous today throughout nearly every branch of modern physics, the diagrams did not enter physicists' toolkit overnight. Personal mentoring and extended face-to-face contact proved crucial for putting the diagrams into circulation. Once they did begin to circulate, physicists crafted a dizzying array of uses and interpretations for them, far beyond anything Feynman had imagined. Drawing on insights from sociology and art history, the book scrutinizes what it takes for strange new tools to become "second nature." (For a synopsis, see "Physics and
Feynman's Diagrams.") The book has been honored with the Pfizer Award of the History of Science Society (2007) and the Book Prize of the Forum for History of Science in America (2006).

How the Hippies Saved Physics: Science, Counterculture, and the Quantum Revival (W. W. Norton, 2011) focuses on the rocky transition of the 1970s and 1980s. Caught off-guard as physicists' postwar boom years turned to bust, a small group banded together to carve out a new role for the physicist. Holding Ph.D.s from elite programs but with no job prospects in sight, they set up shop in Berkeley, California, and called themselves the "Fundamental Fysiks Group." They chased the mysteries of quantum theory amid the Bay Area's blossoming counterculture and New Age movements, and their investigations began to reflect the era's many enthusiasms. Bell's theorem and quantum entanglement, for example, suggested possibilities for mind reading. The group carved out a parallel universe, outside academia, and parlayed their interest into a widespread cultural phenomenon. They cultivated a new set of patrons, from the CIA to self-made entrepreneurs of the California "human potential" movement; and they established alternative forums in which to puzzle through the foundations of quantum theory, including a long-running seminar series at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. Their popular books became bestselling icons, including Fritjof Capra's The Tao of Physics (1975) and Gary Zukav's The Dancing Wu Li Masters (1979). Items from the group also got picked up in the nation's physics classrooms, smuggling back in some sustained attention to the foundations of quantum theory. As I trace in the book, the group's brainstorming sessions laid crucial groundwork for today's quantum information science. The book was named "Book of the Year" by Physics World magazine, and also received the Davis Prize from the History of Science Society. Watch a lecture based on the book.

More recently I have been working on a book about physics and the Cold War. American Physics and the Cold War Bubble (University of Chicago Press, in preparation) examines a massive experiment in social engineering that unfolded in the United States during the decades after World War II, in what might be called the credentialing of America. Higher education was booming; the classrooms of American colleges and universities bulged as never before, thanks to programs like the G.I. Bill. Enrollments in nearly every field grew exponentially. Yet graduate enrollments in physics grew fastest of all, at almost twice the rate of all other fields combined. Twenty-five years later, enrollments across nearly all fields in the United States underwent a major contraction. Physics again led the way, falling faster and deeper than any other field. Rising fastest and falling hardest, physics set the trend for larger transitions in American intellectual life, both in good times and bad. Unprecedented enrollment pressures -- and their equally unprecedented disappearance -- changed the nature of what it meant to be a physicist, from the rise of bureaucracy, to the specter of specialization, to a shift in the guiding epistemology behind cutting-edge research. The physicists' case stands as a cautionary tale -- highlighting the promise as well as the special challenges inherent in runaway growth -- as fields such as genomics and nanotechnology undergo their own frantic expansion today. Watch a lecture based on the book.

My physics research is in particle cosmology, working at the interface of particle physics and gravitation. In particular, most of my work has focused on inflationary cosmology: a distinct phase in the evolution of our universe, about 13.8 billion years ago, during which the size of the universe expanded exponentially quickly. (For a review, see "Inflationary Cosmology.") Since 2011, I have been leading a research group at MIT with Alan Guth on aspects of cosmic inflation. Much like the early universe, our group has grown rapidly.

My interest has centered on whether successful inflation might be achieved with familiar particles from the Standard Model of particle physics, such as the Higgs boson. Recent work has focused on predictions from models with several interacting fields, and whether multifield models produce new features that could be observed in the cosmic microwave background radiation, compared to single-field models. Much of this work has also concerned interactions between matter and gravity that extend beyond Einstein's general relativity, and whether such "nonminimal couplings" might account for specific observable features in the spectrum of primordial perturbations. For a brief and accessible introduction to this work, see "Elegant Wiggles: Why the Universe is Lumpy."

I have also been studying how such inflationary expansion might have come to an end in a process called "reheating," when the energy that had driven the rapid expansion was converted into particles more like the kind we see around us today. In the process, the supercooled state during inflation eventually reaches thermal equilibrium at some high temperature, setting the stage for standard big-bang cosmic evolution. Understanding reheating is therefore critical for connecting two well-tested cosmic epochs: early-universe inflation and big-bang nucleosynthesis. In many models, the energy that had driven inflation decays resonantly, far from equilibrium. The nonperturbative techniques used to study reheating can also be applied to many other kinds of interactions, such as phase transitions in condensed-matter physics and in nuclear physics. For a review of post-inflation reheating, see "Nonperturbative dynamics of reheating after inflation."

Members of the "Cosmic Bell" team at MIT, September 2014. L to R: Andrew Friedman, Jason Gallicchio, Anton Zeilinger, and David Kaiser.

Another topic of interest is developing a loophole-free experimental test of Bell's inequality. Albert Einstein famously dismissed quantum entanglement as "spooky actions at a distance," yet dozens of experimental tests on entangled systems since the 1970s have upheld the strange predictions of quantum mechanics. Even in these fascinating experiments, however, several "loopholes" remain, which could allow a theory much like the type Einstein preferred to mimic the predictions of quantum theory. Our proposal would use real-time observations of some of the oldest light in the cosmos -- for exapmle, from distant quasars -- to set the detector settings in a Bell test, while the entangled pair is in flight. Such a procedure could allow us to conduct the first-ever loophole-free experimental test of Bell's inequality. We are working with Anton Zeilinger and his group in Vienna to conduct such tests. For a brief introduction to Bell's inequality and quantum entanglement, read this excerpt in Scientific American from my book, How the Hippies Saved Physics. For an accessible introduction to our "cosmic Bell" experiments, see Andrew Friedman's essay on the NOVA blog, or my short piece in the New York Times.

A complementary line of inquiry focuses on the complex dynamics of networks, with applications to understanding the growth and development of scientific research fields: a cross between statistical mechanics and the history and sociology of science. Together with Luis Bettencourt, I have been exploring whether the critical dynamics of topological phase transitions in scientists' collaboration networks might betray signs of universality. Research areas in fields as disparate as theoretical physics and biomedicine might undergo the same basic teamwork and co-authorship mechanisms early in their histories, even though they involve vastly different numbers of researchers and published articles per year.

American Physics and the Cold War Bubble (University of Chicago Press, in preparation). A study of the intertwining of institutions and epistemology in American
higher education during the Cold War. Following the fortunes of the discipline of physics -- which grew fastest of all fields after World War II, and crashed hardest around 1970 -- the book traces how the boom-and-bust cycle of enrollments shaped what would count as "good" or "appropriate" scholarship. Watch a lecture based on the book.

Groovy Science: Knowledge, Innovation, and American Counterculture (University of Chicago Press, 2016). Outspoken commentators in the 1960s and 1970s fretted that American youth culture -- especially "hippies" and the counterculture -- turned its back on science and technology while chasing New Age enthusiasms. The essays in Groovy Science challenge that stereotype. Many members of the American counterculture sought a new kind of "groovy science": small-scale and big-picture, sometimes with hidden links to Cold War projects but championed by charismatic figures bent on self-expression and self-exploration. Several once-radical ideas of groovy science have since been absorbed into the mainstream -- their psychedelic, technicolor roots largely forgotten.

Science and the American Century, co-edited with Sally Gregory Kohlstedt (University of Chicago Press, 2013). The twentieth century was one of astonishing change in science, especially as pursued in the United States. Against a backdrop of dramatic political and economic shifts brought by world wars, intermittent depressions, sporadic and occasionally massive increases in funding, and expanding private patronage, this scientific work fundamentally reshaped everyday life. Science and the American Century offers some of the most significant contributions to the study of the history of science, technology, and medicine during the twentieth century, all drawn from the pages of the journal Isis.

How the Hippies Saved Physics: Science, Counterculture, and the Quantum Revival (W. W. Norton, 2011; Italian translation, 2012; Chinese translation, 2014.). In the 1970s, amidst severe cutbacks on physics funding, a small group of underemployed physicists in Berkeley decided to throw off the constraints of academia and explore the wilder side of science. Dubbing themselves the "Fundamental Fysiks Group," they pursued a freewheeling, speculative approach to physics. They studied quantum theory alongside Eastern mysticism and psychic mind-reading, discussing the latest developments while lounging in hot tubs. Unlikely as it may seem, their work on Bell's theorem and quantum entanglement helped pave the way for today's advances in quantum information science. Watch a lecture based on the book.

Becoming MIT: Moments of Decision, ed. David Kaiser (MIT Press, 2010). The Massachusetts Institute of Technology marks the 150th anniversary of its founding in 2011. This book examines a series of turning points, crucial decisions that helped define the MIT we know today. Many of these issues continue to have relevance: the moral implications of defense contracts, the optimal balance between government funding and private investment, and the right combination of basic science, engineering, and humanistic scholarship in the curriculum.

Drawing Theories Apart: The Dispersion of Feynman Diagrams in Postwar Physics, (University of Chicago Press, 2005). A study of how Richard Feynman's calculational aids spread from a small cluster of users to dominate several branches of modern physics. Along the way, many groups of young physicists adapted the diagrams' pictorial form, calculational role, and interpreted meaning. The dispersion of Feynman diagrams thus illuminates larger transformations of postwar theoretical physics, from what would count as "theory" to how students would be trained to become "theorists." (For a synopsis, see "Physics and Feynman's Diagrams.")

Pedagogy and the Practice of Science: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, ed. David Kaiser (MIT Press, 2005). The essays collected in this volume examine how scientists' and engineers' training shapes their research and careers. Examples are drawn from a variety of cultural and political settings during the 19th and 20th centuries (ranging from Victorian Britain to interwar Japan, Stalinist Russia, and Cold War America), and from a range of fields (from theoretical physics to electrical engineering, nuclear weapons science to quantum chemistry).

Science and Society: The History of Modern Physical Science in the Twentieth Century (New York: Routledge, 2001). A 4-volume anthology edited and with introductions by Peter Galison, Michael Gordin, and David Kaiser. Volume 1 (Making Special Relativity); Volume 2 (Making General Relativity); Volume 3 (Quantum Histories); and Volume 4 (Physical Science and the Language of War).

David Kaiser, "Making Tools Travel: Pedagogy and the Transfer of Skill in Postwar Theoretical Physics," in Pedagogy and the Practice of Science: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, ed. David Kaiser (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005), 41-74.

2005.

Andrew Warwick and David Kaiser, "Kuhn, Foucault, and the Power of Pedagogy," in Pedagogy and the Practice of Science: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, ed. David Kaiser (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005), 393-409.

Joel Brown, "For this musician, pain has been the family business" (about the documentary
film Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives
by Mark Oliver Evertt, son of quantum physicist Hugh Everett),
Boston Globe (19 October 2008).

Martin Uhlir, "How to steal an atomic bomb:
With American physicist David Kaiser on the theft of the atomic bomb, Soviet espionage, and the
deepest secrets of the universe," (in Czech)
Respekt 41 (6 October 2008): 42-45.

Robin Lloyd, "Era of scientific secrecy nears its end:
Emergence of online venues opening up the scientific process,"
LiveScience.com; also posted on
MSNBC.com (2 September 2008).

American Physical Society, Fellow, elected for "outstanding publications that combine technical mastery of twentieth-century physics with a deep knowledge of recent developments in the history, philosophy, and sociology of science."

Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Graduate Student Council Teaching Award, awarded to one professor in MIT's School of
Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences "for excellence in teaching a graduate level course."

2001.

Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, Levitan Prize
in the Humanities, awarded to one faculty member at MIT for "innovative and
creative scholarship in the humanities."

2000.

British Society for the
History of Science, Ivan Slade Prize (best article in the field) runner-up,
awarded for the article, "
Stick-Figure Realism."